
Y^<^/j: . A^'^^Ccy 



ORATION 



AN D 



POEM, 



DELIVERED BY 



FRAISTCIS V. BALOH, 



w^M. R. HUisrTiisrG-TOisr 



CLASS DAY, 1859. 



A isr 



ORATION, 



DELIVERED BEFORE THE 



CLASS OF 1859, 



JUNE 24, 1859. 



BY FRANCIS V. BALCH. 



BOSTON: 

ALFRED MUDGE & SON, PRINTERS, 34 SCHOOL STREET. 
I860. 






• • « 

* < 
• « • 



OR^TIOISr. 



We have been looking forward, Classmates, ever since we 
first answered to our names in the big white hall yonder, to a 
day when we should all be together for the last time ; when 
assembled in this church, we should listen, with our fathers 
and mothers, our brothers, sisters, and friends, to what all 
think and feel, but one must put into stuttering speech. We 
have never lost sight of this day ; we have looked forward to 
it from out the smoke of college pipes ; we have seen its sights 
in the embers of the college fires ; we have wondered how we 
should feel ; we have poetized about it ; we have talked about 
it ; and now it is here. We are now to know feeling instead 
of sentiment, and find out whether four years' rubbing of the 
branches and wedding of the bark, makes the sap of one 
tree run in the veins and arteries of its neighbor, and whether 
there will be no scar when they are taken up, each with 
his clod of earth, and transplanted to other groves than those 
of old Harvard. 

Why is it that memory stands sideways, half covered with 
flowers ? Would the ladies tell us that it is because she thinks 
her profile more beautiful than her full face ? I think not. 

The pleasures of hope and the pleasures of memory ought 
to have been written by the same person. To the child, Hope 
is all in all ; she is not half, but wholly covered with flowers, 
and she looks with full expectant face toward the future. As 
the child becomes a boy, the boy a man, Hope turns sometimes 
to watch some object that she has longed for and loved, as it 
glides past her, by her far into the distance, and then we call 
her memory. 



When manliood is reached, we find her halting half decided, 
so many of her dearest dreams have, fulfilled or unfulfilled, 
drifted past her. She stands sideways, now catching a glimpse 
of the more distant objects, as those near at hand lead and 
direct her gaze towards them, now turning with eagerness not 
yet burnt out, towards the future. She is half covered with 
flowers ; half of her original store she has committed to .the 
care of the past. Let us first, then, look back with memory, 
then, turning, look forward with hope. 

And first looking back, we have done, and thought, and felt, 
just what others have done, and thought, and felt ; we have 
nothing new to ofier. But will there ever come a time when 
we shall read that Mrs. Brown has fallen down the back-stairs 
and broken an arm with less interest, because Mrs. Smith did 
just the same thing the day before ? Heaven forbid ! We 
rather shout out what a coincidence, and find therein new theme 
of congratulation. What is it makes all the hens in a barn- 
yard cackle when one has laid an egg ? It is because all have 
done the same before. It is companionable. If one egg only 
had been laid since the creation of the world, and the race 
of hens continued by a miracle, there would not have been 
half so much noise made about that solitary egg as there is 
about the common every day event of the barn-yard. You 
are to hear then an old story ; and if you have thought it, 
or heard it, or read it before, try to like it all the better. 
Every student of Dickens knows that, with a good hearty 
purpose to enjoy, and by " making believe very much," orange- 
peel and water makes itself one with the vintage of Bacchus. 

Shakespeare never went to college, or he would have given 
us pictures of college life, which would not only eternize the 
men of his own year, or his own university, but which, like 
certain almanacs, would be adapted to every latitude. We 
can imagine Hamlet, for instance, entering a Freshman, within 
the college pale. He is very shy, he looks about him with 
suspicion that somebody is laughing at him ; and yet he has an 



5 

intense consciousness that he is to be a great man, and almost 
confounds to he, with is. He writes home affectionate letters 
to Ophelia, and somehow she receives the same impression 
regarding his destiny. He is so self-contained that he makes 
few friends ; those few, fast ones. He is laughed at a good 
deal, on account of his queer ways. He begins to have a 
little of the Pariah look, which misjudgment causes in the 
misjudged. His letters to Ophelia are sometimes bitter. He 
takes to smoking as a consolation. He neglects exercise, and 
has the dyspepsia. He separates himself more and more from 
his classmates, and is more and more disliked, as a problem 
vanity-vexing and insoluble. He tries to find ease of mind 
in severe, unseasonable study. He graduates a dyspeptic, a 
prey to crazy fancies, the wreck of a noble man, to take his 
part in the great tragedy. This we should not have been told ; 
we should have been made to feel it, perhaps by a single 
scene, almost by a single word ; and that phase of college life 
would have been so engraved, that all future attempts at its 
portrayal must be mere copies from that great eternal graving 
of the stone. 

Mercutio would have come to college a true typical boy at 
heart, honest, open-hearted, as full of fun as a young colt, and 
not very fond of study. He would distinguish himself on the 
foot-ball ground by the good-natured, impartial way in which 
he would distribute his blows. He would rapidly become a 
favorite with every part of his class. He would obtain a 
great reputation for wit, and would be rather dreaded as well 
as liked, for he would be down on humbug wherever he found 
it, or thought that he found it. At different parts of his 
career, he would have a weakness come over him for fine 
clothes, fine horses and the theatre. But by the pure force of 
his open, manly heart, he wins through all dangers, and there 
is no one you are more sorry to shake hands with at parting 
than Mercutio. But in painting, or photograph, if we had it, 
we should think natural only what we had ourselves seen or 



felt. We have ourselves passed four years of college life, and 
we ought to be able to learn from memory, without the need of 
painting or sketch, what that life is. 

As we look back, we see at first nothing but confusion. 
Classmates' faces, now well known and loved, huddle and 
change, once again strange and first seen. There seems to 
come a far off clang of bells, as though heard in the drowsy 
morning hours ; now we seem in chapel — now in the reci- 
tation room — now at home, dreaming before the fire, or 
striving to pin our minds to some lesson; lesson as hard, 
and mind as reluctant, as the wall and fly of an entomologist. 
But in whatever place we are, the faces are around us, bright, 
boyish faces, now smiling, now grave. Gradually they 
become distinct, and scene follows scene. The 16 University, 
and the first sight of our classmates ; the Brattle House, with 
its eager questionings of how you got ofi" at examination ; the 
second day, with its anxious waiting for the certificate of stu- 
dentship ; the first recitation ; the first prayers ; the first 
night spent at our own room; the first meal taken at our 
boarding-house ; the first property in a fellow creature as 
a chum. All these things were novel and extraordinary at 
first, but in a week or two seemed like the habits of years. 
The anxious collation of marks; the whispered confidences, 
which the face rendered unnecessary, that the whisperer had 
got eight in mathematics. Evening walks and musings on 
the bridge. Long letters home, and earnest longing for 
vacation, as the weeks creep along to Thanksgiving, from 
Thanksgiving to Christmas, through New Year to the happy 
day when we go to give our first college experience, and dis- 
play haply our first coat or beaver at our homes. The 
long winter evenings, occupied with cards or friendly conver- 
sation, dictionaries and slates ; bright with firelight and mirth, 
or dismally blue with the memory of home, and the thought of 
Zumpt's grammar in the morning. The constant expectation 
of visits from the higher classes, and the heroic resolves of 



tesistance thereto. The pleasant evenings of our first College 
Society, in the little room in the Huhneman Engine House, 
where we listened to extemporaneous disquisitions upon the 
nakedness of the land, and the best line of conduct for a man 
on the same side of the fence with a mad bull. The time of 
matriculation, and the awe, not unmixed with admiration, with 
which quiet men looked on the fast fellows who had got pri- 
vates and were not matriculated. The first leakage of our 
class, which even at this early stage lost several members by 
exosmosis while repairing the loss by endosmosis. The first 
lessons of the fallibility of that instinct which every man arro- 
gates to himself, and which Thackeray describes when he says 
he has a nose for a snob, as we find classmates, whom we 
had thought at first bores and scrubs, made of good compan- 
ionable stuff. The College wharf, where the boats lay, and 
where we sat with feet hanging over, and watched the 
crews embark, and heard the cabalistic words , " toss oars," 
" back water," and " give way, all." The brigade of amateur 
surveyors, who, named after the great Apostle, no doubt, 
were called the Eliot Lancers, and marched through the 
yard, once or twice a week, to the admiration of all beholders. 
It is very pleasant now to look back upon the dusty road, the 
little ui'chins round the compass, whom we frightened ofi" by 
threatening to take their bearings ; the red of the flag just 
seen among the leaves at some distant corner ; the men with 
the chain coming, crawling along like the canker worms, those 
surveyors of the leaves. — The long summer afternoons, when 
we sat in the wide cushioned window seats, and thought 
almost complacently of dew dropping from the fourth story, 
that heaven of Sophomores. The drudgery and delight; the 
gradual accustomance to the dreary old entries, so common- 
place and prison-like ; to the queer old rooms, with their shut- 
ters and fireplaces; till we hung an association upon every 
peg, and a love grew like Hecuba's, which at parting made her 
cling to, and kiss the dusty, worn door-sill of her home. The 



8 

first Class-day and the approaching Sophomoredom, which even 
then seemed to be ours 5 the examinations, and our supercilious 
inspection of the candidates for admission, the Freshmen, as 
we loved to call them. — All these thoughts belong to our Fresh- 
man year. 

The glories of the first summer vacation separate the two 
years ; then come the greetings round the pump and at the door- 
steps, on our return as Sophomores. Rather confused, but very 
lively, is the picture which memory gives me of the foot-ball 
match. The rushes, the rallies, the jams against the fence, the 
fair kicks and the unfair; the frantic shouts of "home, home 
with her!" need to be seen to be understood, as much as 
Niagara does. Among its battered hats and inspired faces, 
comes up before me most vividly the old white beaver, with a 
star and '59 on its front, and under it the face of him who 
marshalled us that day, as he will on this more peaceful occa- 
sion. 

And now that we have got to the Delta, let us stay and 
see the cricket clubs with their talk about wickets, and bats and 
English rules, and how this man, who had never before distin- 
guished himself, was a first-rate bowler, and that, a stunning 
batsman. 

If from the Delta we turn to the boat-houses by the 
river, we shall probably see the same athletic men who figured 
in the games on land, returning from the race of the ill-fated 
Hurons, to which we rowed down with flags flying, confident of 
victory as Achilles ; and from which we returned wishing very 
heartily that our boat was a galley, so that we could row 
through port-holes, and be hidden from the sight of man. 

In the second term came the practical experiments in chem- 
istry, our little mortars and pestles and crucibles, our tripods 
and re-agents. How happy we felt and how wise, how like 
unto the Alchemists of old, as we brewed our hydro-sulphuric 
acid, while chum swore his virgin Sophomore oaths, at what he 
chose to call the infernal smell. That Sophomore year flew 



9 

by, and though I know nothing about the owl which as the 
bird of wisdom would not naturally take its departure with 
the Sophomore year, it is yet certain that bats on midnight 
wing attended. Some of us, certainl}', did not study much, 
but we had a jolly time ; and the loafs round the doorsteps, 
the frolics at the bakery, the smoking and singing and 
lightheartedness of that year were very pleasant at the 
time, even if in sober moments we were obliged to make com- 
promise with our industrial instincts by resolves of work in 
the to-come. 

There was the Sophomore Class supper, worthy of the place 
where it was held, and the recollections of patriotism which 
belong to it. First came the mysterious warning that the 
conveyances would be at a certain wliispered spot. The 
expectant ride in the long, ark-like omnibusses ; then the long 
tables, with the pleasant kindly faces — a better garnishing 
than any plate ; the toasts and songs and ode ; and the ride 
home, with the moon, just setting, tangled among elm boughs ; 
the going to prayers next morning ; all these things, overlaid 
by new pleasures and cares, rise up at the name of Lexington* 
There was the Institute, if you seek literary reminiscences, 
with its lectures and papers and debates. But though many 
pleasant evenings were thus passed in the old room, and 
in the old chairs, scarred with the inscriptions which, perhaps, 
our fathers made when they were Sophomores, and wore the 
crow's feet, which are now elsewhere, upon their sleeve cuffs, 
and grumbled at commons, that is not our only tie to it. 

There we listened to the orators and poets of the Institute, 
and Hasty Pudding. There have been held our Class-meet- 
ings, from the one where we elected our marshalls for the 
Franklin Statue, to the one where we ballotted for the Navy 
Club. There, almost concealed in smoke, tipped back, if 
there was room, upon two legs, we have debated matters 
of grave concern, and howled down motions of adjournment, 
2 



10 

and bothered the chairman by voting on both sides of the 
same question at once. But for one purpose we have never 
assembled there. We have never come there, as we have seen 
class after class, with sober faces and subdued voices, to mourn 
for a classmate's death ; we have never passed that vote, for 
the wearing of crape on the left arm, which shows that one of 
our number has been taken from the studies of earth to those 
of Heaven. 

The first term. Junior, is traditionally a term of study, and 
we formed no exception to the rule. 

In this year the struggle between Greeks and anti-Greeks 
culminated in the overthrow of the former, and the estab- 
lishment of our Class Society and Club Room. I think 
that this measure, more than anything that happened during 
our course, affected our character as a Class. It tended 
to isolate us from other classes, and to throw us more 
upon ourselves ; it tended to substitute class feeling for society 
feeling. And as long as college can't be one great Utopian 
whole, split by no jealousies, divided by no boundary lines, I 
think class feeling is much preferable to society feeling. The 
boundary lines of class feeling are more inclusive, and more 
natural than those of society feeling. I think our Class 
Society, though not a perfect, was a good means of obtaining 
its end. It did obtain it in a great measure. I think we 
owe to it, in great measure, the fact of our being a united 
class. I think, however fashionable it may have been of 
late to laugh at the idea of that class unity which a year or 
two back it was fashionable to boast of, that we really have 
had a united class. We have had cliques, as all classes have, 
and our unity has not prevented us, as no sane man would 
have expected it to, from having individual and conflicting 
opinions upon matters of general interest ; but I do earnestly 
believe that the tie of classmate, has, in any differences we 
may have had, been stretched, not broken. 

The fate of the Society we all remember, and need not to 



11 

be reminded of; the club room filled with papers, and, at first, 
with classmates : then thinly attended ; then almost deserted ; 
the regular meetings afcII attended and enjoyed to the last. 
Without it I think our two last years would neither have been 
so pleasant nor so profitable as they have been. 

The first and second exhibitions and mockparts came along 
and passed in due time, as such things must, but at the close 
of the year there was a great excitement. It is easy to re- 
call the mill-dam and its houses, Braman's Baths, and the 
boats in the Back Bay, covered with people, as the pistol 
signalled the start for the race. How we stood up in our 
boats, and strained our necks as the Harvard shot ahead ; 
how hoarsely we cheered her, and how anxiously waited her 
return. How we watched to see that man who bent a little 
lower to his oar than the rest of the crew ] our own stake in 
the race ; who stooped to conquer. It is easy to recall this, 
for we have just seen it all again ; and may it be seen every 
year till the forgotten traditions of our country shall leave it 
uncertain whether Bunker Hill monument was raised to com- 
memorate the battle on the height or the victory on the bay. — 
We should not have had the joy we did in that victory and 
those which followed it, had it not been for our previous 
defeats. — Then, with the Senior year came the feeling that 
we were doing every thing for the last time, and accompanying 
this, the feeling that, as far as college was concerned, our 
course was run ; our fight fought ; and that no effort of ours 
could materially change the built-up habits of four years. 
However mistaken this view of the matter may be, it is 
pretty extensively taken in practice, and accounts for some 
otherwise perplexing phenomena of the Senior year. Studies 
are a good deal cast by, there is a general desire to make the 
most of the joys of college life while it passes. Breezes, from 
one quarter after another, blow over the ripening grain, and 
find it flexile. Now every body is going in for sparring, and 
if you go into any room you see festoons of gloves on the walls, 



12 

and very likely, you are invited to have a round with some 
pugilistic friend. Again, chess is all the rage ; and a chess- 
board is on every table, and Morphy's games are as much a 
study as were Heenan's rounds before. Again cricket is 
revived, and every one is to be found upon the Delta. 

But with all the childish eagerness for amusement which 
shows itself more in the young man who is a Senior, than in the 
young boy who is a Freshman, because the one fears to be 
thought unmanly, the other does not fear to be called boyish ; 
with all the loitering round the yard, and matching of coppers, 
and whooping and jollity ; the shade of the portal of life is 
passing over all, and is in part the cause of the merriment 
which seems . so thoughtless. As you catch a man alone in 
his room, with his feet on the fender, his face is grave, and the 
blues are frequent and troublesome visitants. The studies, 
too, tend to this ; there is more thought and less drudgery in 
them; more lectures, less recitation. We are granted the 
blessing of seeing the noble, kindly face of Agassiz, and 
hearing from him of the old world creatures. We listen, too, 
to the lectures on metaphysics, and obtain some idea, at 
least, of what a disciple must have felt at the feet of Plato, 
while, listening to the theory of worlds, we feel our minds 
grow as we listen. 

The second term these lectures, though missed, were partly 
compensated for by the lectures on poetry and history. Nor 
were the lectures all that the lecturer on poetry gave us. About 
a dozen started with him to follow Dante through his journey 
into the other world ; those of us who accompanied him through 
the ever deepening shades of the Inferno, the ever brightening 
ascent of the Purgatorio, the glories of the Paradiso, will not 
soon forget either the pleasures or the lessons of the way. 
Some were left behind in the Inferno, some in the Purgatorio, 
five or six persevered to the end, and, near the end of the 
year, read the concluding glories of the Paradiso. If inter- 
course with noble and honest natures in books and in tlie body 



13 

can do men good, those men, besides some of the happiest 
hours of their course, will trace to their reading of Dante a 
higher resolve for life and a more firm hope in death than 
they would otherwise have had. 

When I question memory farther as to the events of that 
last half of the Senior year, which was hardly here before it 
was gone, she tells me she has not had time to make them 
hers ; that they yet belong to the present. There is, however 
one scene, which, although it belongs to the present, belongs 
likewise to the past, for it is the crown of our jovial college 
life. A night which we passed all together ; which we passed 
in song, and merriment, and wine ; a morning which found us 
still at table, and which shone upon us from the east with 
red eye, as if he, too, had been up all night, while we sang 
Auld Lang Syne on the beach. To our Class supper not an 
unpleasant memory belongs ; let it be the last recorded scene 
of our college life. 

But what has our Ahna Mater' been doing while we have 
been munching turnovers in the pantry, or playing marbles in 
the yard, or conning our lessons in the nursery ? Has she 
kept quietly on with her household matters and got no new 
apron, built no new sheds, made no more rules, added no 
foot to her domains ? Memory is yet ready for this task. 

We entered college at the commencement of the metamor- 
phic period. Old stones that had been in existence for un- 
numbered years were melting, running, changing in the fierce 
heat; new strata were forced up from below. With us, 
entered upon his duties, one who had heard his Master's voice 
summoning him to preach here the religion of love. It was 
only for a week or two that we were under the working of the 
old system, and were called to prayers morning and night. 

Then came a dismal time, when we hurried off to prayers with 
yet unsatisfied hankering for hot cakes, and when at every clash 
of tumbler or plate, we thought we heard the bell. Then 
came the system of before-breakfast prayers back again, blessed 



14 

to every landlady and student, and the period from which a 
renewal of good digestion in the college should be dated. 
The old station house had, soon after our arrival, ceased to 
sound to the noise of the engine, and had been dedicated to the 
musical muse, in name at least. There a choir was trained, and 
now morning services included the singing of a hymn. Soon 
the rectangular majesty of Boylston began to rise up in the yard, 
with its solid granite ; and Holden, yielding to it its treasures, 
became a recitation room. Next the chapel was talked of and 
begun. We can remember the solitary workman who used to 
be employed upon that structure, who looked as though Marius, 
tired with moralizing over the ruins of Carthage, had set to 
work with stone and mortar earnestly to rebuild it. At last 
it was finished, and we listened to our last prayer in that 
chapel which had welcomed us as Freshmen, and which had 
seen us Sophomores, Juniors, Seniors, in its different corners. 
Though it was inconvenient and small, I think we shall never 
have the same feeling for the new chapel as for that old room, 
with its railed side seats ; its gallery, where, on Sundays, we 
were reminded of our sisters and homes by the unwonted and 
dear sight of women's faces; its red pulpit, its little organ; all 
we thought stupid enough at the time, but now they seem 
very pleasant. There we first ^,sked a blessing upon friends, 
left, perhaps, for the first time, there we mp.de our first appear- 
ance in gowns since the era of whistles and alphabets. 

Last of all has sprung up, like Aladdin's palace, the new gym- 
nasium. While we were wondering if there ever would be 
such a thing as a college gymnasium, it was finished, and a 
new era commenced for college youth. Soon recitations in 
muscle will be the order of the day, and it will be added to 
the diplomas that any graduate has a right to run, jump, and 
box in the yard of the University, or any of the halls or 
buildings thereof. 

Within the last year, too, Graduate's became a student's 
home, and the Brattle House an inn of court, and all these 
tilings seem already as if they had never been otherwise. 



15 

And now that we have finished our college life, have run 
through its changes and transformations, from Freshman to 
Senior, what have we gained ? How does what we are, com- 
pare with what we meant to be, and with what we were when 
we first came here ? What were our sub-freshmanic lonQ:in2:s, 
visions, resolutions ? Some boys are scholars from their 
cradle ; too pure for dreams of wealth, too young for dreams 
of love, they see before them the universe waiting for them to 
come and unlock its mysteries. But those who love knowl- 
edge for its own sake are very few. Such love needs the 
sickly childhood, the stolen hours of study and of musing, the 
nervous, sensitive, scholarly temperament; it is sorely tried by 
the rudeness of schoolmates' rough, boisterous natures ; the 
compulsory and distateful studies of the schoolroom; the 
glimpses of impossibility which are obtained as, travelling on, 
day after day, thirsty and footsore, we find well after well, the 
longed for of morning and the reached of night, fade into the 
vacuity of a vanished mirage. It is failure, and not effort, 
that makes the student gray, and stooping, and wrinkled, before 
his time, so that you can scarcely recognise in him the bold, 
fiery young man who, a few years before, stood, with his -^open 
sesame," at the gates of the temple of knoAvledge. So long 
and bitter a lesson that is, which the world has been learning 
and forgetting ever since it was, that man knows, and can 
know, nothing. I do not believe that the lesson will ever be 
learned for one generation, for one man, by another. It is in 
the struggle for the impossible that the possible is obtained. 
If a scientific man, at the present day, can believe that science 
will yet discover the efficient causes of things ; if we see men 
daily around us going to work, persistently and confidently, 
to solve problems which the wisest and greatest have failed 
in; what must have been the dreams of studious youth, when 
the path of knowledge was hardly tried, when few had come 
back to report their failure, when no revelation from above 



16 

had proclaimed impossibility? What must have been the 
dreams of Aristotle, when, as a young man, he sought the 
instructions of Plato ? How near must have seemed to him 
the peak of wisdom ; how golden in sunlight the intervening 
summits ; how bridged with purple mist the intervening val- 
leys. It is this faith and zeal which is the life of a scholar. 
When this is taken away, little by little, by the discovery that 
the mysteries of life are not for his unassisted reason to solve ; 
that there are limits to the mind which he cannot see but can feel, 
as the baby, when it stretches out its hands after the moon and 
feels them strike against the cool glass of the window panes ; 
there seems nothing for him but despair. But soon he finds 
that love and goodness are around him, not as problems 
tempting solution, but as consoling friends, just as the child, 
sobbing at his failure, finds around him his mother's arms. 
And then he learns that though much is hidden, much is 
revealed to the earnest searcher, and new strength returns. 
This lesson learnt, the learner is a Christian scholar. This 
lesson some learn; and for some the time of pupilage is the 
four years of college life. To such a one, the looking back 
must be painful as well as pleasant, as he compares what he 
has attained with what he purposed ; the long, vigorous, unas- 
sisted strides with which he meant to gain the goal, changed 
to the halting steps of one leaning on the staff of other's wis- 
dom, travelling over a road already worn by many feet, per- 
haps merely to add a handful of gravel to the road-making at 
the yet unfinished end of the causeway. 

But while a few have fought through obstacles, have hewn 
down trees, and worked for months and years to make them- 
selves a ladder, with firm resolve to plant it on the wall of 
ignorance and scale its battlements, full of confidence and 
hope, others have been pushed up to that ladder, because 
those who had mounted it were held in more repute, or because 
they had better opportunities for becoming wealthy and pow- 
erful. What have these men gained — tliese who sought only 



17 

a diploma and four years' leisure or those who sought wisdom 
as a charmed sword to make the world tremble in its ignorance, 
and heap its treasures at their feet ? While the true scholarly- 
spirit has learnt, through bruised and bleeding wings, the bars 
of its body cage, the great majority of us have been engaged 
in learning that they had any wings at all. Those who came 
here with no taste for study, have not learned a great many 
facts, are not great linguists or physicists, and are not likely to 
be ; but while they have aimed at just getting through college, or 
at obtaining such knowledge of a particular branch as to assist 
them in future life, they have almost unconsciously acquired, 
at the same time, a love of knowledge in itself, an opening of 
the eyelids to the beauty and truth of the universe, if not the 
firm will to fix the gaze upon it. I think Charles Dickens has 
praised our College in the fittest terms^ for while they do not 
apply to all its graduates, they certainly do to those we are 
now speaking of. He says that our College, if it does not always 
produce scholars, never produces bigots. It not only never 
produces bigots, but if there is one thing that can be predicated 
of every graduate of Harvard College, — all the talk about the 
tyranny of public opinion here, to the contrary notwithstand- 
ing, — I think it is that he has a more liberal spirit, more charity 
for others, more aspirations for himself than he would have 
had if he had not been here. Some may not think such gen- 
eral improvement a sufficient warrant for what they would call 
the waste of four years, of the best part of a man's life. If 
we cannot show our attainments in a tangible form, we are 
accounted unprofitable servants. I hold that if the servant, 
who received the one talent, had bought with it seed corn, 
and then hid it in the ground, his lord would not have chid 
him, when he returned, and found that he had not given it to 
the exchangers. I hold that we have been doing just this 
thing : we have raised up on the ground of our minds yearly 
crops of clover (which is, in my allegory, mathematics and 
Latin, ethics and metaphysics), and Time has come along 
3 



18 

shortly and cut down our crops. A very small portion we 
have garnered up, but by far the largest part has lain on the 
ground, and rotting, fertilized it. I contend that every man 
(the one even who looks back with most regret on his college 
course, and we all have opportunities lost, to mourn) has a 
better clover field than he would have had if he had spent 
these four years out of college. 

We have a field to cultivate, which shall sooner or later 
come under Grod's own heaven, have the sunshine of his 
smile, the rain of angel's tears ; that land we must have in 
the best possible condition for that great and blessed time. 
These four years have been given us to cultivate, to enrich the 
land, and to garner up grain for the future, while others have 
spent them in wringing from the soil, with diJB&culty, their 
daily bread. We have had four years to think, to study, to 
look around us, while others have been at work. If we have 
not, through most utter recklessness, sulBFered weeds to choke 
it, the soil must have had its vigor increased by the rains 
and dews, the sunshine and shadow of every day, of the every 
year. 

But this is not all that we have gained by our course. What 
is it that is so hard to leave ? We are all sorry, some more 
sorry and some less, to go. Why is it ? It surely is not 
the recitations that we regret. Is it the beatiful yard, with its 
noble elms, the paths where we have so often walked, the rooms 
which we have lived in ? No one will ask this question, who 
has returned to Cambridge during the summer vacation, and 
seen the trees in full pride of leaves, the buildings standing 
as of old, and yet all so changed, so saddening, that he cannot 
bear to look at them. It is that, then, which is here in term- 
time, and not in vacation, that we love, and feel that we cannot 
leave. It is the faces of our classmates in the windows, and 
round the doorsteps, that we miss. We have been together 
four years, with common pursuits, common pleasures ; we liave 
met together at church and recitation rooms, at meals, at 



19 

society meetings, at tlie bookstore, at the post-office, on the 

road to Mount Auburn, in the cars, everywhere. We have 

talked to one another on the river, when the moving of the 

oar became mechanical, and we could, without fear of crabs, 

watch the sunset ; in our rooms, when the fire burning brightly 

up the chimney, only served to toast one side at a time ; in 

long evening walks, where it seemed almost as though our 

thoughts spoke, not our tongues. We have learned to know 

and to love one another as students, classmates, friends ; had 

we gained nothing from college but its friendships, and from 

friendship nothing but its pleasures, we should have been paid 

for our four years by the recollections which will give us 

pleasure through life. But pleasure is not all that college 

friendship has done for us ] it has, in many cases, purified us, 

encouraged us, given new hope and new motive for effort. It 

is from these college friends that we are to part, but not for 

ever ; it is for this that we are sad, but not wholly sad. 

We should be unworthy of manhood, if we were afraid or 

sorry ta enter upon its duties. Good-bye to the years of 

pleasure, of sunshine, of youth : but hail to manhood, to life, 

to work. From the orreen lanes on to the dustv thorouirhfare 

of life we come, accompanied by hope, just saddening into 

memory, by strength of will and trust. We should stand, as 

we look upon the future, with uncovered heads, with prayerful, 

hopeful, wistful eyes — as we would have Columbus, or Stand- 

ish have stood, at the bows of their ships, looking on to the 

continent before. 

Some of us think that they have seen life already; they 

wo,uld say, perhaps, that they have seen the elephant, that they 
know all about it. They have seen the elephant in the charge 
of his keeper, obedient to the word of command; but have 
they seen him in his wild state, as crashing through the wait-a- 
bit thorns, he charges trumpeting upon the hunter. I have 
never been to Africa, I have never seen life; but I very 
strongly suspect that life bears very little resemblance to, tho 



20 

four years Y/e have spent here^ dependent on our relatives for 
support, with the troubles and cares of life fenced out by the 
stone posts and brown rails of the fence yonder. How, then, 
can we look into the future, if it is so unlike the past ? Only, 
it seems, by looking within. When we go out from college, 
into life, we shall go, as we went from the last recitation, by 
different paths, under different trees, to different ends — groups 
of friends, hanging together for a little while, but separating, 
losing one after another, as each comes to his own room. But 
though we separate, we may still be together in purpose, in 
feeling, while those who keep on the same path longest may 
be moving with entirely differeut motives ^nd impulses. The 
particular path in life which we shall take is, to some, decided j 
to some, undecided ; but that, it seems to me, does not matter 
so much. We do not look into the future so much to see 
whether we shall be lawyers or merchants, poor or wealthy, in 
this place or that, as to see what we shall be as men. Our 
future is to come from God, and from ourselves ; what will 
happen to us, is his part 5 no curiosity of ours will avail to 
pierce the mist in that direction ; what we shall do is our part, 
that we can partly foretell. I have already compared our 
college to a nursery of young trees. By studying the twigs, 
the bark, the folded and unfolding leaves of the buds, we can 
get at their future ; we can tell whether they will bear plums 
or apples, pears or peaches ; but that is not all, they are all 
grafted. You must look and see whether the tree is sending 
its blood up into the veins of the graft, or whether it is 
sending up suckers from the roots. When you have deter- 
mined these two points about the trees, the rest depends upon 
the husbandman ; they will bear more or less ; they will live 
or die according as the place where he sets them be favorable 
or unfavorable. So man has two natures, the stock and the 
graft, his passions and his conscience. His will rules both ; 
his reason is a ready advocate for either before its throne. 
On these two things depends that part of our future, with 
Tjvhich we have to do. 



21 

Perhaps we can best discover tlie nature of our impulses 
in our day dreams. What, in them, do we look forward to 
in life ? Is your dream a little cottage, with wife and chil- 
dren, just grass land enough behind for a cow, and no osten- 
ensible means of support ? Or is your dream of a battle- 
field, where you lead your regiment on to victory, and are 
enabled to rear yourself just near enough to the perpen- 
dicular, after you have received your death wound, to see 
the enemy flying, and speak a word or two of farewell ? Or 
IS it of the Senate House, its large, unruly assembly as still as 
death, with the magnetism of sympathy binding them all to 
you, and you to them ? Is it of the study, with its lamp and 
the light of some great discovery breaking over your face ? 
Is it of some retired monastery, where you could spend all 
your days in thought, uninterrupted, excepting by chants and 
prayers ? Is it of wealth, of power to work your will, to 
renew the pleasures and luxuries of a Eoman, Nerone Con- 
sule ? Is it a place at the bedside of the sick, at the fireside 
of the poor ? 

These are dreams of youth ; perhaps we have felt them all ; 
perhaps. Heaven help them ! some have never felt any of them. 
In this matter of fact, skeptical, sneering age, there are some 
shrivelled up, premature old men, who never have had any 
dreams, who would not confess it if they had, who would think 
it weak and wicked to have an ounce of good red blood in 
their veins, and whose fundamental article of belief is, that 
the earth is hollow, and made so on purpose for hell to be put 
in the middle of it. I think this is due in most cases to dys- 
pepsia, but there seem to be some chronic cases. If these 
men really believed what they think they do, there would be 
nothing for them to do here but to wait for death. But there 
seems to be a power in some minds of digesting, or rather 
swallowing, dreary maxims, without assimilating them much, 
and without hurting themselves so much as might be expected, 
just as ostriches can eat iron and stones j and we will hope 



22 

that this is the case with these young disciples of the weeping 
philosophers. To you, then, who have hopes not merely in 
death, but in life, who think God put us on the earth to live 
there, not to keep wishing to die, which of these dreams is to 
you most frequent and most welcome ? If you dream of the 
battle, the senate, the study, you are ambitious. Is your 
dream of money, you are pleasure loving. Is it of a cottage 
and retirement, you are indolent and wanting in energy. This 
nature, whatever it may be, you are to carry into the future 
with you, and by it your purposes will be in great measure 
swayed. 

But there is that other element of your purposes, conscience 
yet to discover before we can see the future. Each can see 
for himself how far conscience has ruled his motives hitherto, 
and then, knowing the strength of his impulses and their 
nature, and the strength of his conscience, he can be his own 
prophet of the issue of the conflict between them. This con- 
flict is the great fact of life ; but its object is not the destruc- 
tion of any part of our nature, but the ruling of it ; not the 
destruction of the stock, but the forcing of its sap to the uses 
of the graft. 

Life has been so often compared to a battle, that it is 
the very tritest of common-places to repeat it; but still, 
I think the comparison is wrong ; I think life is not a battle, but 
a campaign. We are born into the world soldiers ; there are two 
standards, we must choose between them; but we are not fight- 
ing all the time ; we have to plant, to harvest, to build bridges, 
to do all the work of a soldiery which has to support itself, and 
yet be constantly ready for surprise and attack. 

But this external conflict with evil has its result determined 
by an inner one. We are told that the shout of an army 
before it joins battle is an indication of its victory or defeat ; 
that shout tells the issue of the internal struggle of motives 
on which all depends ; it tells which has gained the day in 
the soldier's breast — coward fear, or noble daring. When 



23 

that is known, victory is secure; for even if the soldier 
dies, he so dies that his death does more for his cause than 
his life would have done. We are about to come out into 
a broader field of external warfare than we have ever known 
before; we are about to have our places assigned us for 
life. Which side we shall choose will be determined by 
the issue of our internal conflict; each one must figure that 
out for himself; but don't let us think that we can get along 
without fighting ; don't let us skulk and hide when the trumpet 
calls us to battle. This is not meant to be a sermon ; the side 
we take is our own matter ; but having chosen it, for God's 
sake, let us play the part of men. We have had four years 
to prepare our weapons, let us not let them rust through dis- 
use. If you hope, fight with good courage, trusting for para- 
dise. If you despair, fight all the harder; die like a wolf 
among the hounds, not like a pigeon on its nest. 

Harvard College once boasted a military company ; I have 
read an account of it somewhere ; how a beautiful lady 
presented a standard, how valiant speeches were made. I 
think if that company had gone into action, it would have 
been on the side of truth and right. May we not form a 
company too ? shall we not fight better, feeling that we are 
one in purpose though far ofP? 

Before we separate to-night, let us add the tie of comrade 
in arms to that of classmate ; let the shout which we send up 
this afternoon tell our determination to fight and to conquer, 
a class one in soul and purpose; and, remembering that 
courage is more tried in the march, the siege, the camp, than 
in the battle, pray for patient courage of the God of battles 
on the eve of our entrance upon the campaign of life. 



poem: 



I. 

The Cliffs of Gaspe ! since the mountains were 

They Ve hemmed the coast from Lawrence to Chaleur, 

So high aloft they rear their jagged crest, 

The sea gull, peering from her stony nest, 

Sees the proud breakers toss their spray below, 

But hears no token of the ebb or flow. 

So steep, the bird, from out her eyrie gray. 

With folded pinion drops upon the prey. 

Against these crags, the bastions of the shore. 

Twice in the day the hosts of ocean pour. 

Mailed in their brightness, crested with the foam. 

Mad for assault, the restless legions come ; 

Their leader she, who, from her crescent car. 

Beckons the ranks, and marshalls all the war. 

Twice in the day the strong Atlantic tide 

Falls back with murmurs, vanquished and defied, — 

While, proudly smiling on the yielded shore. 

The Cliffs of Gaspe dream their peril o'er. 

But still the Queen her watery ranks assures, 

" Forward," she cries, " the victory yet is yours. 

The blows you carry with each onward roll. 

Saps the foundation that supports the whole ; 

Crumbled already lies the lower wall, 

Ere long the shelving battlements shall fall." 



28 



And thus the siege continues, nor in vain, 

For when, with April, suns grow warm again. 

And frosts can hold the o'erhanging crags no more, 

They tumble thundering to the distant shore. 

Not there to linger, as they strike the land, 

The victor waves come shouting up the strand, 

And, step by step, retreating bear away 

Far out to ocean their long looked for prey. 

Long time those fragments, buried in the deep, 

Swept by the stream, their silent courses keep. 

Hidden their uiotions, all is calm above. 

While still they w^,nder ^,s the currents move. 

The ages pass ! at length from out the main, 

Blowly upheaved, those fragments ^^ise ag^in ; 

And, builded firm by ocean's tireless hands, 

At last in strength a new-born island stands. 

An islq.nd crowned, it may be, with the palm, 

Where naught, save pipe of birds, breaks through the 

. perfumed calm. 
As Gaspe's Clifis along the northern strand. 
So by life's sea the homes of learning stand ; 
Aloft in air they rear a placid face. 
The great world's surges warring at their base. 
About their brow empyreal breezes play. 
And gently fan the thought of fall away, 
liong we have hung upon the parent rock, 
Firm knit, and proof against the billowy shock y 
With quiet hearts and unconcerned, surveyed 
The noisy realms of politics and trade. 
But not forever shelving crags may stand. 
And laugh to scorn an angry Titan's hand. 
The waves must conquer, brothers we must fall 
Sundered and broken from the upper wall. 
To-day the cliff, to-morrow the cold strand ; 
Then angry tides, and then farewell to land. 



29 



On ocean's bed, where hidden currents stray, 
Unwatched shall each be borne his separate way ; 
And last, the years accomplished, once again, 
One here, one there, we rise from out the main. 
So may we rise that our long life's work yield 
Foundation stones, for other times to build 
Strong citadels of truth, where future souls 
May sit, nor feel a fear, while that great ocean rolls. 

Now fade the last of boyhood's stars from sight, 

And turning eastward to the wakening light, 

As birds sing " Ave " when the day is born. 

So we would carol to our manhood's morn. 

But carol what ? the same old drowsy themes, 

The cloister memories and the cloister dreams ? 

Aye, aye, the same, none other were sincere ; 

None true, for me to sing, for you to hear. 

Perhaps you '11 vote sincerity a bore. 

And say ^' 'Tis true that two and two make four. 

But for all that the fact is somewhat old. 

And heaven will stand though that truth be not told." 

So when the minstrel, for the thousandth time. 

Sings to Sir Knight some ancient battle rhyme, 

My Lady dallies with her falcon's chain. 

Or counts the colors in the oriel pane ; 

Or, waxing fretful, " Prythee minstrel mine. 

Sing something new — a song of love or wine." 

But he, " Fair lady I can only sound 

The strains I know, the music I have found ; 

My life was shapen in the days of eld, 

I keep the course my steps have ever held." 

Your minstrel so will sing, for well he knows 

That, though the wind still bloweth whence it rose, 

Each freshened blast the constant current brings. 

Sweeps a new music from the -^olian strings. 



30 



II. 

The College Medley ; that shall be 

The poem of to-day. 
This jumble up of man and man^ 

And "boy" perhaps you'll say, 
Satirical, but we're not proud, 

So have it your own way. 

Perhaps, you'd think to see them there, 

Got up in black and white, 
Each vest a linen moon behind 

The grim dress coat of night ; 
Perhaps, you'd think them all the same — 

What wonder if you might. 

But, trust me, it were hard to find 

A figure to express 
The droll variety beneath 

This checker-hoard of dress. 
The greater can't be typefied. 

Says Whately, by the less. 

But here's a figure that will do. 
You must have seen, no doubt. 

Those boards of penny sculpture decked 
So ludicrously out. 

Which artists of the plaster school 
Go balancing about. 

Where massive Daniel, togaed stands. 
And glares a white-washed eye 

At mournful Clytie, vis-a-vis 
With impudent Paul-Pry ; 

While Fisher Boy and little Sam 
Are grouping on the sly. 



31 



Well, Ahna Mater sports a crown 

Quite like, and since to-day 
She's "bound to sell the choicest lot,"' 

As auction people say, 
Suppose we sketch a head or two 

Before they're bid away. 

Now, don't expect analysis, 

And all that sort of thino:, 
For human nature is a tune 

We, of the unfledg'd wing, 
Had better leave to older birds, 

And not attempt to sing. 

For learning character is like 

That harmless rural fun 
Of catching fire-flies by the glow, — 

You think the work is done, 
And straight the portals of the fist 

Draw open, one by one j 

But just the moment when the last 

Small finger opens dark. 
Some rods ahead the truant gleams, 

And leaves you to remark. 
Well wing it where you will for me. 

So blaze away old spark. 

We knew each other through and through, 
Before six months were turned, 

And ever since have been at work 
Unlearning what we learned ; 

Till four years lands us at a point 
That half a one had spurned. 



32 



So none of that — we'll only strive 

To paint the outward shows, 
Nor from the moss that wraps the bud, 

Attempt to judge the rose ; 
Convinced that, rocket-like, each holds 

More stars than you'd suppose. 

"Look pleasant," cries photographist. 

When, having boxed the sun. 
Intent to get the very life, 

He points his light-charged gun ; 
While you sit toasting on his fork, 

Until your face is done. 

So now, "look pleasant" while you're sketch'd. 

Put on your brightest smile ; 
That one, for instance, which you wore 

Beneath your maiden tile. 
But let each countenance parade 

His own peculiar style. 

There walks a college sage, behold 

That transcendental gaze ! 
He'll cut us ; never mind, that's one 

Of his amusing ways. 
He always wears the vacant look 

Of ruminants at graze. 

He's up, no doubt, enjoying now 

Some seventh heavenly view. 
Suppose we drag him down to earth — 

Ah, Solon ! how d'ye do ? 
"Subjectively, I'm very well, 

Objectively, are you ? " 



33 



There, that's the style — the laws of thought 

Supply his every need ; 
The laws of college, what are they ? 

Deductive laws, indeed ! 
"You cannot get to right," he says, 

"Unless you go to Reid." 

A jest from him ! when that comes off, 

'T will happen without fail. 
That yonder mastodon will step 

Jocosely o'er his rail. 
Throw open wide his grim old jaws 

And wag his fossil tail. 

But laugh at Solon as you will, 

He has a quiet way 
Of turning corners on your heart, 

And making people say, 
That never truer brick than he 

Was baked of mortal clay. 

He has his queer ideas of things. 

But yet he's liberal, too ; 
And though he thinks your " plane " commands 

A far too narrow view, 
Why what of that, his plane's inclined. 

And he'll slide down to you. 

In very truth, a child ; for though 

Philosophy, he thinks. 
Has clothed his life in coat of mail, 

And fastened well the links. 
The kindly nature hid within 

Will glimmer through the chinks. 

5 



34 



But, hark ! a sound ! and what a sound ! 

That cannot be a fiddle ; 
Unless, indeed, the poker's at 

A solo on the griddle ; 
A cornet ? no. A flute ? far less. 

0, strange harmonic riddle ! 

'T is very like that dying shriek, 

The product of the jerk 
The organ-man communicates 

To keep the crank at work j 
While, stooping down to pick a cent, 

He smiles a grateful smirk. 

0, now I'll tell you what it is ; 

That's practice with a view 
To such perfection as shall charm 

The proud Pierian few. 
And win, at last, a humble post 

Amid that tuneful crew. 

That instrument, what e'er it is, 

He's at the livelong day ; 
He heedeth naught the funny things 

His jeering comrades say ; 
For, singular anomaly. 

It is his work to play. 

He's vocal, too, the flowers of song 

He wreathes about his lyre, 
The glee-club knows that voice of old, 

It warbles in the choir ; 
And oft we've heard it through the trees, 

And oft beside the fire. 



35 



Go on, 0, youth ! thou yet shalt win 

Thine instrumental way ; 
Thou yet shalt blow a lusty blast 

Some Exhibition Day. 
But really, do you blow, or beat. 

Or scrape, or what ? 0, say ! 

But look, here comes our boating friend. 

The Ajax of our race. 
That arm, that shoulder, see them move ! 

Come, is not there a grace. 
Your weak Apollo never knew, 

For all his foremost place ? 

While winter holds, and, closed in peace 
Stand Braman's temple doors. 

While crooked Charles no longer hears 
The click of racing oars. 

Like other mortals, Ajax lives 
In quiet on our shores. 

But when to winter's icy sway 

Succeeds a milder reign, 
And rival boatmen boldly cast 

The gauntlet down again, 
Our couchant lion jumps afoot, 

And shakes his sleepy mane. 

" Porridge for twenty, oxen raw !*' 

Shouts he of mighty limb ; 
And trains, and trains, and trains away,. 

And groweth gaunt and grim ; 
Till, cherub-like, a pair of arms 

Is all that's left of him. 



36 



0, then, come on, 3^e Irishmen ! 

Bring out each gallant crew ! 
'^Red Michael/' "Shamrock/' "Exile," come, 

And try your luck anew ; 
You've made your boasts for half a year, 

Now come, and prove them true. 

They come — they wait — the signal's flash ! 

Hurrah ! there start the prows ! 
And on they dash, and .on they dash, 

While landward cheerings rouse, 
Till, once again, a signal gleams 

Athwart old Harvard's bows. 

From roof and casement proudly then 

Patrician victory speaks ; 
But from the long plebeian wall 

Come back Milesian shrieks ; 
And there poor modern Athens stands, 

And blushes for her Greeks. 

Enough of this, enough of this ; 

These images of snow. 
We've moulded here are trickling down 

To meet the stream, I know ; 
But still 'twere pleasant, while they thaw, 

To sketch a score or so. 

The Ladies' men, that gallant corps. 

Those martyrs to the sex, 
Who wear their haloes, not as crowns, 

But starched about their necks ; 
For so the latest martyr book 

Jlxplicitly directs. 



37 

Incipient Sawbones — they who feed 

Their scientific wits 
On poor domestic animals, 

Cut ruthlessly to bits ; 
Grimalkin eyes them as they pass, 

And trembles for her kits. 

Then, too, the men who study hard, 
And then, the men who don't ; 

And then, the men who see the point, 
And then, the men who won't ; 

Then, bashful men, who're took aback 
When others take affront. 

But, no ; our subject points ahead ; 

'Tis only half unrolled ; 
What's all this medley coming to, 

Cast in the future's mould ? 
To meet which solemn query, friend, 

A tale will now be told. 



ni. 

A window yonder looks upon the west — 

A small snug window, cushioned like a nest, 

And nest-like hung among the tree tops high, 

Full fronting on a great blue wall of sky. 

Recumbent here, and fanned by airs of June, 

The pleasant influence of the afternoon 

Comes o'er one, wafting visions without number, — 

A sweet bird music lulling him to slumber. 

So let him sleep, but wake him ere the sun. 

Smiling and flushed because his race is run. 

Assumes the flaming crown his trusty steeds have won. 

From Auburn's turret to the Belmont hills, 

A crimson glory all the horizon fills ; 



38 

And shooting upwards to each cloudy fold, 
Dyes heaven with hues, earth blushes to behold. 
! then our dreamer finds his dreams come true, 
For every cloud that floats about the blue. 
As if himself had all its motions wrought. 
Takes form and color suited to his thought. 
There stands the castle, there the smiling face 
Of her he dreamt should lend the castle grace ; 
And further off are golden fields, and groves. 
And lakes, and islands, and the hills he loves. 
One Afternoon — ere yet had passed away 
The flower wreathed sceptre from the hands of May, 
Beside that window fronting on the sky, 
A dreamer sat and watched the clouds go by. 
The sun was near his setting, and the breeze. 
Full from the west, came fluttering thro' the trees ; 
His thoughts were on the future ; how shall we — 
So soon to start upon our quest — who see, 
From the bright centre where we st^,nd and mark, 
Ten thousand paths ray out into the dark, — 
Choose each the walk his feet may best pursue. 
And enter on the maze with hope the only clew. 
Four beaten paths are calling us to choose. 
Each points to something it were ill to lose ; 
One to the ships, the warehouse, e^nd the loom ; 
A second, meekly, to the sick man's room. 
A third, to her who holds the balanced scales ; 
A fourth, devoutly, to the altar rails. 
How shall we choose ? the busy wheels are dumb 
That weave the pattern of the years to come. 
More had he uttered, but the evening breeze 
Whispered, " Look westward to yon sunset seas ;" 
He looked, and lo ! those seas were white with sails, 
The wings of nations, and he saw the trails. 



39 



The foamy trails of monsters breathing smoke, 
And tearing ocean with their iron stroke. 
Along the coast were stately harbors, lined 
With jutting piers, and cities ranged behind. 
Inland, the mill beside the falling stream, 
And tall lone chimneys garlanded with steam. 
Well pleased he gazed : a noble dream, he said. 
The world of strength, the lordly realms of trade. 
Then rose the breeze, and gathering full and strong. 
Swept to his ears these measured words of song : 

0, hark to the clattering anvils ! 

0, list to the whistling steam ! 
See the engine pulses beating ! 

See the restless shuttles gleam ! 
And arouse, and join the workers, 

For we have no time to dream. 
The mighty world rolls on and on. 

And circles the shining sun. 
Full many a work have brave men wrought, 

But a work remains to be done. 

The anchor-tied ships lie tossing, 

Impatient, upon the bay ; 
Their long straight fingers beckoning. 

And their soundless voices say. 
Come scatter your knowledge o'er the earth. 

And the harvest shall repay ; 
For the patient world rolls on and on. 

And circles the shining sun. 
While the task that is set for man to do, 

Is scarcely yet begun. 

You may bridge the ocean courses ; 

You may level the rolling hills ; 
Send joy to the laborer's cottage. 

And fruit to the fields he tills. 



40 

And your hands may forge the future, 

If the heart within you wills. 
For the world rolls on, and on, and on, 

And circles the shining sun, 
And roll she shall, while the ages live. 

Till the prize of her race be won. 

The song was ended, and the breeze at rest ; 

Again the dreamer turned him to the west. 

Gone the bright vision, gone the sails, the smoke. 

Like ghostly fabric at the enchanter's stroke. 

But higher up, above the sunset glow, 

Along the sky, a great white cloud moved slow ; 

And from the cloud looked out a pallid face, 

With large, sunk orbs of such a mournful grace. 

And yet so human, surely now there lies 

A lurking soul beneath those great cloud eyes. 

So thought the dreamer, when the breeze once more 

From the far verge up-springing as before. 

In tones now faint and low, these words of anguish bore 

0, passer by, the stony street 

Has echoed many a tread to-day ; 
In vain I 've called the hurrying feet, 

Tbey would not, would not stay. 
But thou, perhaps, canst hear my cry, 

Tho' fevered lips are almost dumb. 
The day is dying ; must I die ? 

0, come and heal me, come. 

'Tis not enough that rich men leave 

Their marble charities to earth ; 
The heavenly fingers surely weave 

A garland of more worth 



41 



For him who pities while he lives, 

Who walks the world with tender ejes, 

Whose art directs the aid he gives. 
And bids the sick man rise. 

But none have found me lonely here, 

Where I so long have lain ; 
Ah me ! this feeble voice, I fear. 

Will scarce be raised again. 
So, passer by, who'er thou art 

Whose shadow walks my chamber wall, 
If thine's a beating, human heart, 

hear me, hear me call ! 



The song was ended, and the breeze at rest ; 
Again the dreamer turned him to the west. 
As phantom pictures, from the lantern thrown. 
Melt to new forms before the old are flown, 
So the sad features left the vision's face. 
And sterner lines now lingered in their place. 
Those great cloud-eyes now sparkled in the light, 
Brows like Athena's wore the crown of might , 
The snowy robes majestic motions made. 
One hand the balance held, and one the blade. 
-' Justice enthroned ! " the dazzled dreamer cries, 
'' What call is hers ?" again the laden skies 
Sound forth their message as the breezes rise : 

Subjects ! Children ! I, your sovereign. 

Watch you from my mountain throne ; 
Discord, stalking blind amongst you. 

Ploughs and plants the fields you own. 
Pluck the kernels from her furrows ! 

Pluck them ere the blades be grown ! 
Heal the feud of man with brother ; 

Mete to each his righteous due ; 
6 



42 

Guard the orphan and the widow ; 

Draw the boundary limits true ; 
Check the frenzy of the many ; 

Shield the weakness of the few. 

Cleave a pathway through the people, 

Climb the granite steps of state ; 
Proudly tread the floors of senates, 

Mingle in the mad debate. 
Sounding measured words of wisdom, 

O'er the yells of party hate ; 
Gird with law your young Republic, 

Bind her azure zone with might, 
Set the stars upon her scutcheon, 

Bid them shed serenest light, — 
Beacons for the shipwrecked nations. 

Plunging blindly through the night. 

The song was ended, and the breeze at rest ; 
Once more the dreamer turned him to the west. 
Like mighty flocks bent homeward to the fold, 
Along the verge the cloudy monsters rolled ; 
And gathering thick about the sinking day, 
Caught the rich crimson of his latest ray. 
Piled each on each, in grand confusion cast. 
Long hung they ragged, fashionless, and vast ; 
Till, slowly shifting from the huddled swarm, 
At last their beauty floated into form. 
A cloud cathedral, pinnacled with light. 
Stood proudly fronting on approaching night ; 
From sculptured niche and jutting corner quaint. 
Looked the calm martyr, or the happy saint. 
Through dappled windows a warm sunshine streamed, 
And, girt with haloes, heads of prophets gleamed. 
Then from the carven doors, wide open flung. 
Came organ melodies, and thus they sung : 



43 



0, for a band of loyal hearts ! 

In these our faithless days, 
To walk out boldly through the worlds 

And God's own banner raise. 
From dull content and curtained ease, 

From shadow lands of doubt, 
To bid all souls come stand where rolls 

Their Captain's battle shout. 

To breathe o'er troubled breasts the word 

That stilled the lake of old ; 
To cheer life's worn out voyagers Oin^ 

Though clouds and mist enfold. 
The fields are yellow — breezy smiles 

About the harvest creep ; 
From heavenly walls the master calls. 

But where are they who reap ? 
Oh, for a shadow of the zeal 

That dared, in elder time. 
To gild the cross upon its shield. 

And seek the holy clime. 
Oh, for a glimmer of the light 

That shone from martyr eyes. 
Through scorn and shame, and smoke and flame, 

Still trustful tathe skies! 

The breeze fell off, the singing was at rest ; 
The dreamer woke, and turned him to the west. 
The sun was sunk, the cloud had sailed away, 
And one pale planet watched the grave of day. 
What think ye, friends, and was the dreamer mad ? 
Were all the forms with which his fancy clad 
The clouded heavens, idle visions wrought 
From the poor fabric of disordered thought ? 
0, say not thus ! but rather strive to see 
Prophetic gleamings of the things to be. 



44 



'Tis true, we're young, our hands are powerless now^ 

But hearts are earnest, hope is on our brow. 

Ye seasoned critics, whose complacent eyes 

Watch aspiration with amused surprise ; 

Who, from your icy summits, love to throw 

A patron's coldness on the youthful glow. 

Who cry, "Aurora lit our morning too ; 

Poor things ! but they must learn the lesson new."' 

Strive as ye will to dam the freshet flood, 

The impetuous torrent of the early blood. 

Strive as ye will that eager pulse to tame. 

The great boy heart will beat on just the same. 

The hill born fountain, in its upward course, 

Strives still to reach the level of its source, 

But strives in vain, it cannot match its birth. 

The glistening waters tumble back to earth. 

But not disheartened ever more they rise, 

Those glistening waters, eager for the skies. 

So let us rival, with untiring aim. 

The proud head waters whence our being came. 

What though, unequal to the skyward call. 

Forever longing we forever fall ? 

The fountain's music whispers through the air, 

'Tis then most God-like, having failed, to dare. 

And now, companions, it is ours to stand. 

And wisely, boldly, choose ; then, like a band 

Of sturdy woodsmen, with our axes bright 

Slung over shoulders trustful of their might. 

With blithesome footsteps, let us go to thread 

The mighty forest glooming thick ahead. 

There each to hew his pathway as he will, 

Alone and severed, yet remembering still 

The dewy freshness of the happy ways 

We've trod together in these earlier days, 

While through the twilight shone life's morning star. 

And the grim forest shook its leaves afar. 




